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Post by captainbasil on Dec 22, 2013 9:05:38 GMT -5
I bought my wife the huge coffee table book Babylon 5 At 20 for Christmas. She's the only one I know who loves this show more than me. It's the ultimate photo tribute to the show. It's geek heaven between two covers.
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Post by Mel on Dec 25, 2013 0:59:23 GMT -5
Oh, that sounds like a fabulous book. Has she opened the gift yet? Did she love it?
After some effort, I found it online. It's expensive, but no doubt worth it. 
How lucky you two are to have a spouse that likes SF.
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Post by captainbasil on Dec 27, 2013 6:26:42 GMT -5
Oh, that sounds like a fabulous book. Has she opened the gift yet? Did she love it?
After some effort, I found it online. It's expensive, but no doubt worth it.
How lucky you two are to have a spouse that likes SF.
Yes, she loved it, Mel. We had to go away for Christmas so I gave it to her a few days early. It is expensive. It was 102 bucks with the postage from Cafe Press but it's all high gloss photo paper. I'm not going to complain about the price. It's a beautiful book. |
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Post by TrekBeatTK on Aug 6, 2014 21:20:25 GMT -5
Tonight I finally watched The Lost Tales, thus bringing my B5 journey to a close (except for Crusade, which I haven't finished yet).
I liked the opening, and the use of G'Kar's voiceover. That was a nice touch. It was good to see images of the other cast members who wouldn't appear in these stories. Though the fact that it started with the explosion of the station and then rewound time, while nice for fans who have missed the show, meant that a new viewer can't just watch this before "Sleeping in Light" without skipping the opening.
Overall, I enjoyed The Lost Tales. The effects work was crappy in places, but I've basically come to expect that as part of the B5 aesthetic. Well, correction, the effects generally were pretty good. It was the composites that were dodgy. Lots of green screen work that was obvious. But again, since the series was often that way, I don't mind as much. Thematically, the two stories were united by ideas of spiritualism, determinism and "big ideas". On one hand, Lockley's dealing with matters of faith in the supernatural, and on the other hand Sheridan is dealing with magic and faith in humanity (or Centaurity?).
The first story on one hand didn't really need to be a Babylon 5 story. It had only a cursory connection to it, just being set on the station and featuring Lockley. But it was nice to get a little more character for her since we never got to know her all that well, and I though JMS wrote some really nice stuff in there. It's interesting to hear the priest talk about the waning of faith in the age of science, as that wasn't ever quite evident on the series. The various clergy were too busy arguing among themselves. But it's a fair point. Especially in universe you can see how it would be easy to discount the idea of angels after the revelation that the Vorlons had appeared in angelic forms to men before, or that there are beings walking around taking people's souls. His speech called to mind some who think space travel itself is an affront to God and a transgression. That's an idea I've often thought would make for a great short story of some sort. There was some great dialogue in there between him and the possessed, even if some of the story stuck by some of the old tricks from The Exorcist (I was so afraid that bed was going to levitate). His scripture references were well-reasoned and thought out. JMS did a good job handling the nuances of the story. The ultimate explanation does also smack of certain Judeo-Christian apocryphal mythology as well. The notion of a demonic being imprisoned on earth is reminiscent of the notion of Watchers from the Book of Enoch (Aronofsky put this in his Noah movie as well). It's also referenced in one of the epistles of Peter, where he refers to those who "did not keep their proper domain" or something like that and they are imprisoned. Peter in the Greek actually refers to Tartarus there, the abode where in Homeric mythology the titans were imprisoned. Anyway, I found JMS' use of these existent notions kept the story smart and intelligently made. Though the scholar and nerd in me will point out that the sun did not stand still at Jericho but at Gibeon, though it was in the book of Joshua. But that's just me being picky.
It was good to see Sheridan again. And hey, it's Galen the Technomage. I had forgotten all about the technomages. Essentially what we have here is a "what if you could kill Hitler as a kid?" story. That's an old trope, but it's handled well here because it's kept personal. I liked Sheridan's banter with the reporter, and the mentions of some of other cast members. Good hearing about Londo's darkness (really wish that had been fully paid off in the series). And it was a very lovely touch to say that G'Kar and Dr. Franklin were exploring "beyond the rim", an oblique reference to the passing of the actors. That was a nice little nod. While neither story really revolved much around the station, JMS did try to give shout outs about each of the players and find moments on Earth and Minbar and throw in a couple Starfurys (starfuries?). One thing that did bother me was that in the dream it was New York being destroyed. Why is it ALWAYS New York?
I also noticed that in both stories, there was a very specific camera move that rotated while someone was in bed and zoomed in just as their eyes opened. In Lockley's case, it was opening to a moment of insomnia which later led to epiphany. In Sheridan's case, it was opening to a dream of revelation which would test him. It was an interesting visual way of connecting the two stories.
While ultimately The Lost Tales is pretty inconsequential, it was well made for a low-budget project and there was some solid writing here from JMS, which isn't always the case. I thought he did a good job here. Rather than go full sci-fi or action-oriented as he had with Legend of the Rangers and Call to Arms, he kept it philosophical, which was a nice change of pace. It was a nice little gift for fans who missed the series, and I basically enjoyed it.
-TK
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Post by captainbasil on Aug 7, 2014 6:45:28 GMT -5
The Lost Tales never went anywhere because Warner Brothers wouldn't give them any money. Yes, the effecrs are terrible but it was a budget thing. I loved the whole Lost Tales concept and it would have been a great Direct-to-Video series if the writers and producers had more than 89 cents an episode to work with.
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Post by StarFuryG7 on Aug 7, 2014 14:47:50 GMT -5
Overall, I enjoyed The Lost Tales. The effects work was crappy in places, but I've basically come to expect that as part of the B5 aesthetic. Well, correction, the effects generally were pretty good. It was the composites that were dodgy. Lots of green screen work that was obvious. But again, since the series was often that way, I don't mind as much.
But yes, it was great to see Bruce appear as Sheridan again, and I remember that I was struck, the first and only time I've watched it thus far (even though I own a copy of it on DVD) by how easy it was to see him slip back into that role after a decade, without missing a beat in terms of the performance he gave. It was as though he had just left off with the character the week before.
Oh, and Galen is a regular in "Crusade", although I expect you'll have very mixed feelings about that series --even more than you do about B5 itself. The music is terrible for one, which is immediately noticeable, and at times it's kind of all over the place. Some of the episodes are also rather excruciatingly paced and dull, and in conjunction with the theme music can give Sominex a run for its money. However, it's not all bad either though. I'll leave it to you to decide.
Maybe I'll give "The Lost Tales" another look before the summer is over just for the hell of it. I remember that I liked some of the CGI work in it though. |
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Post by TrekBeatTK on Aug 7, 2014 16:32:20 GMT -5
No, it was much worse here, as they used it even for quarters, to make them look bigger as well as furnished --a HUGE, very noticeable mistake, never done in the television series. As Basil commented, this movie was made on a shoestring budget, with JMS actually directing the thing --something he had no prior experience doing. He was the one who supposedly decided not to produce another one because he felt it couldn't be done justice being produced in that way, and it's true. What also hurt that experimental film though was that Joe didn't intermix the A plot and B plots throughout the thing, shooting them separately instead. That certainly didn't help the production in my view, and definitely hurt it some too.
But yes, it was great to see Bruce appear as Sheridan again, and I remember that I was struck, the first and only time I've watched it thus far (even though I own a copy of it on DVD) was how easy it was to see him slip back into that role after a decade, without missing a beat in terms of the performance he gave. It was as though he had just left off with the character the week before.
Oh, and Galen is a regular in "Crusade", although I expect you'll have very mixed feelings about that series --even more than you do about B5 itself. The music is terrible for one, which is immediately noticeable, and at times it's kind of all over the place. Some of the episodes are also rather excruciatingly paced and dull, and in conjunction with the theme music can give Sominex a run for its money. However, it's not all bad either though. I'll leave it to you to decide.
Maybe I'll give "The Lost Tales" another look before the summer is over just for the hell of it. I remember that I liked some of the CGI work in it though. I watched one or two episodes of Crusade, so I remembered having seen Galen but didn't remember much beyond that. I do need to finish that at some point. Yes, there was too much green screen and it does make it look low-budget, which is what it was. But I had sort of come to expect that and tried to look past it. A lot of the CGI work is good though. It's just the bad mattes around the characters make the composites very obvious. But the ship sequences and stuff look good. I agree, Bruce does seem completely at home in the role. -TK |
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Post by StarFuryG7 on Aug 7, 2014 16:47:28 GMT -5
I honestly don't know what to make of this. A Reboot? In other words, a re-telling of the five-season arc that we've all seen already and know about from having watched the television series? Why go that route? Why not a continuation set in that same universe, though years later?
WTF?
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Post by TrekBeatTK on Aug 7, 2014 17:05:30 GMT -5
I honestly don't know what to make of this. A Reboot? In other words, a re-telling of the five-season arc that we've all seen already and know about from having watched the television series? Why go that route? Why not a continuation set in that same universe, though years later?
WTF? Yeah, I don't know what to think of this either. Why must EVERYTHING be rebooted? It's not even that old a property. I understand on the one hand the argument against a continuation: the station blows up at the end. So then you have to set it in the B5 universe without the B5, or set it before that. But as the actors age that gets harder to pull off. You also have to continually write around the missing people. And the story was basically already told, so you either concoct new stories to tell or you retell your main story in a new way. At the same time, this feels weird, like an alt-B5. Sounds like JMS might be trying to do like the Peter Cushing Doctor Who movies. If he can actually get the funding to make more B5 then good for him, but it does seem like an odd direction and I don't know how to feel about it. It may also be a sneaky way for him to try to drum up nostalgia for the series and get it back in syndication and a proper blu-ray release. -TK |
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Post by StarFuryG7 on Aug 7, 2014 18:22:56 GMT -5
The TV series won't ever be available on Blu-ray --too much involved. All of the special effects would have to be redone, making it cost prohibitive, and given their track record, WB most likely didn't safeguard the original film elements the way Paramount did with the various Trek shows.
So B5 on Blu-ray is just a pipe dream unfortunately.
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Post by captainbasil on Aug 12, 2014 7:20:58 GMT -5
I honestly don't know what to make of this. A Reboot? In other words, a re-telling of the five-season arc that we've all seen already and know about from having watched the television series? Why go that route? Why not a continuation set in that same universe, though years later?
WTF? I don't like reboots very much but I find this confusing. If he wants to do a theatrical version of B5 with new actors, at least tell a story that we have not alraady seen. |
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Post by StarFuryG7 on Aug 12, 2014 12:42:08 GMT -5
I don't like reboots very much but I find this confusing. If he wants to do a theatrical version of B5 with new actors, at least tell a story that we have not alraady seen. I feel the same way. |
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Post by captainbasil on Sept 6, 2014 7:04:04 GMT -5
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Post by TK on Sept 6, 2014 12:11:46 GMT -5
All this really suggests is that the studio may have steered them into the space station direction. We know one of the other ideas at the time was to do a planet-based colony show. However, the "similarities" between the early B5 scripts and the early DS9 scripts are minimal. And while it's possible that Ira Steven Behr came up with the Dominion as an answer to the Shadows, I don't think that was a case of studio interference. -TK |
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Post by StarFuryG7 on Sept 19, 2021 17:26:32 GMT -5
Another series Cram never bothered to check out or get into. Babylon 5 Future Could Include a Series of Animated Movies "There's not a lot of details, and as mentioned the details vary ever so slightly as he was talking to different people but the upshot is WB want to do some animated material set in the B5 universe, movies were mentioned, a series of them was mentioned (perhaps one or two a year)." |
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Post by TrekBeatTK on Sept 21, 2021 16:32:09 GMT -5
Another series Cram never bothered to check out or get into. Babylon 5 Future Could Include a Series of Animated Movies "There's not a lot of details, and as mentioned the details vary ever so slightly as he was talking to different people but the upshot is WB want to do some animated material set in the B5 universe, movies were mentioned, a series of them was mentioned (perhaps one or two a year)."Animated projects might be the way to go with this property (rather than the extremely low-budget Lost Tales), particularly with the now dead cast members. I suspect WB would want to use them to promote the upcoming blurays of the series. But really I suspect it's just because they own the IP and therefore have more content they can funnel to HBO Max. But I also sort of feel like the ship may have passed on this series and a revival this late is unlikely to add anything to it. |
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Post by TrekBeatTK on Sept 27, 2021 12:48:00 GMT -5
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Post by StarFuryG7 on Sept 27, 2021 17:07:51 GMT -5
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Post by StarFuryG7 on May 5, 2023 17:49:46 GMT -5
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Post by TrekBeatTK on May 7, 2023 21:32:37 GMT -5
Yeah, I saw that tweet. Very curious how this will turn out. The trouble in the B5 universe is the question of what story there is to tell because he wrapped it up with a bow as a series, and already you could see it floundering when he had to wrap up most of it early. Sure, they made some movies and a couple aborted spinoffs. That's fine for revisiting characters, but it's going to have to be a one-off story that will simultaneously feel both pointless and nostalgic. Doing it animated is smart (besides dead cast members, it's a sensible use of the budget since The Lost Tales ended up being so thoroughly CG anyway. I don't think there was a single set piece in that whole thing). My nagging suspicion is JMS may use this movie as some sort of universe-bending excuse to set up and justify the existence of the reboot. Like a backdoor pilot. Considering that Call to Arms essentially did that for Crusade (which it occurs to me I never finished), it wouldn't surprise me. Then again, this could just be one of those stories he had lying around for one of the previous projects that never materialized. Hope it's good, and I hope it doesn't stay trapped behind a streaming paywall, especially as it will probably be for some service I don't have. If they put out a bluray they could include it with the series to get people buying that... |
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Post by StarFuryG7 on May 10, 2023 12:44:41 GMT -5
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Post by TrekBeatTK on May 10, 2023 17:39:37 GMT -5
I forgot that Jerry Doyle had died. I used to listen to his radio show. Hope the new voice cast is a good representation for the dead cast members. Phil Lamarr is a great choice for Dr. Franklin.
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Post by Mel on May 11, 2023 17:47:39 GMT -5
TK, good to know that you approve of those voices chosen for those characters. I'm looking forward to this.
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Post by StarFuryG7 on May 22, 2023 11:22:23 GMT -5
My nagging suspicion is JMS may use this movie as some sort of universe-bending excuse to set up and justify the existence of the reboot. Like a backdoor pilot. Considering that Call to Arms essentially did that for Crusade (which it occurs to me I never finished), it wouldn't surprise me. Joe said that if this animated movie does well enough, there will be more of them. As for 'Crusade,' the fact that you didn't get to finish watching it probably doesn't matter because the show was cancelled and didn't come to a proper ending anyway. It's possible Joe will in some way address it and give it some kind of closure using dialogue down the line at some point if the animated films continue beyond this first one. He's alluded to the prospect of a continuation of that defunct series in answer to a question about it on Twitter a few weeks back after the animated movie was announced by WB. I'm also hoping WB announces the series being released on Blu-ray when they make their follow-up announcement about the animated movie in mid-June. We'll see, but my fingers are crossed for that too. It's unbelievable that hasn't happened already. |
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Post by TrekBeatTK on Jun 16, 2023 13:06:46 GMT -5
Trailer for the new animated movie just dropped. Looks good and the voice cast seem like decent sound-alikes for the dead actors.
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Post by StarFuryG7 on Jul 18, 2023 23:13:45 GMT -5
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